Abstract
The Monin–Obukhov similarity theory-based wind speed and potential temperature profiles are inherently coupled to each other. We have developed hybrid approaches to disentangle them, and as a direct consequence, the estimation of Obukhov length (and associated turbulent fluxes) from either wind-speed or temperature measurements becomes an effortless task. Additionally, our approaches give rise to two easily measurable indices of atmospheric stability. We compare these approaches with the traditional gradient and profile methods that require both wind-speed and temperature profile data. Using Monte-Carlo-type numerical experiments we demonstrate that, if the input profiles are free of any random errors, the performance of the proposed hybrid approaches is almost equivalent to the profile method and better than the gradient method. However, the proposed hybrid approaches are less competitive in comparison to their traditional counterparts in the presence of random errors.
Highlights
More than fifty years ago, in a classic paper, Panofsky (1963) wrote1: “In principle, it should be possible to determine the three parameters z0 [aerodynamic roughness length], H [sensible heat flux], and u∗ [friction velocity] from three good wind observations close to the ground
The surface-layer wind speed and potential temperature profile equations based on the Monin–Obukhov similarity theory (MOST; Monin and Obukhov 1954) are written as, Hybrid Profile–Gradient Approaches for the Estimation of
In the MOST relation for the potential temperature profile, Eq 1b, we implicitly assume that the turbulent Prandtl number (PrT ) is equal to one
Summary
More than fifty years ago, in a classic paper, Panofsky (1963) wrote1: “In principle, it should be possible to determine the three parameters z0 [aerodynamic roughness length], H [sensible heat flux], and u∗ [friction velocity] from three good wind observations close to the ground. Swinbank (1964), Klug (1967), and Lo (1979) explored the possibility of estimating turbulent fluxes using only wind-speed measurements Even though they documented reasonably good results, their flux-estimation approaches never received any serious attention in the literature. The flux-estimation approach of Swinbank (1964) was more elegant, but was founded on the strong assumption that the surface-layer wind profile follows an exponential shape (Appendix 2). 2 introduces the newly proposed hybrid flux-estimation approach, and as by-products of this approach, two atmospheric stability indices are derived Background information on the traditional flux-estimation approaches, Swinbank’s exponential wind-profile equation, and several relevant stability correction formulations are provided in the Appendices
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